Tuesday, March 31, 2015
Monday, March 30, 2015
Ice, Ice, Baby: A New SharePoint Update Model?
Friday, March 27, 2015
The SharePoint Cloud Conundrum Continues
by via SharePoint Pro
Thursday, March 26, 2015
SPJS Simple tooltip
By request I have “ripped” the DFFS tooltip from DFFS. This code can use to create a custom tooltip with the same style and function as in DFFS. This means that you can have a hover-over tooltip that sticks if you click the hover-image.
Take a look at it, and familiarize with the code before asking questions.
The tooltip text or HTML is added to the variable “SPJS_SimpleTooltipContents”, and the “key” is used in the image “onmouseover” to pull in the correct tooltip.
<style type="text/css">
div.SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder img{
cursor:pointer;
}
#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder{
/*width:350px;*/
white-space:normal;
background-color:#E7ECEF;
border:1px #9F9E9C solid;
display:none;
font-size:11px;
font-weight:normal;
max-width:500px;
z-index:1001;
}
div.SPJS_SimpleTooltipHolderHead{
height: 16px;
padding:1px;
border-bottom:1px silver solid;
background-color:#0072C6;
}
div.SPJS_SimpleTooltipHolderClose{
float:right;
width: 16px;
height: 16px;
cursor:pointer;
background-repeat: no-repeat;
background-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABAAAAAQCAYAAAAf8/9hAAAAAXNSR0IArs4c6QAAAARnQU1BAACxjwv8YQUAAAAJcEhZcwAADsMAAA7DAcdvqGQAAAAYdEVYdFNvZnR3YXJlAHBhaW50Lm5ldCA0LjAuM4zml1AAAAB5SURBVDhPzZJBDoAgEAN5CG/jF74fGewigSUcOOgkTaTtrhoN/yHnHIuSFGU3djkFAuMqaiWu5RlJ0QvmkzXqEqkfBneBV+TsefMrAIEKK9bDBgUVR/bDQEnlkaO7G+slBCr0cPa8eUkxjz/j8Y9EiSVoesRd/hUh3IlkrlzxjRMpAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC);
}
</style>
<script type="text/javascript">
var SPJS_SimpleTooltipContents = {
"helpText1":"<div style='width:200px;'>This is a custom tooltip for field 1<div style='color:red'>You can use HTML</div></div>",
"helpText2":"<div style='width:200px;'>This is a custom tooltip for field 2<div style='color:red'>You can use HTML</div></div>"
};
var SPJS_SimpleTooltip = {
"data":{
"isSP13":typeof _spPageContextInfo !== "undefined" && _spPageContextInfo.webUIVersion === 15 ? true : false
},
"show":function(elm,key){
var p = $(elm).position(), l = {};
if($("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").length === 0){
$("body").append("<div id='SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder'></div>");
}
$(elm).after($("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder"));
$("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").html("<div style='padding:3px;'>"+(SPJS_SimpleTooltipContents[key] !== undefined ? SPJS_SimpleTooltipContents[key] : "The tooltip for key \""+key+"\" was not found.")+"</div>").attr("pin","0").css({"position":"absolute","left":p.left+15});
// Check left pos
l.l = p.left+30;
l.tw = $("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").width();
l.ww = $(window).width();
if(l.l + l.tw > l.ww){
$("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").css("left",(p.left - (l.l + l.tw - l.ww)));
}
$("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").stop(true,true).fadeIn(200);
},
"click":function(elm){
if($("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").find("div.SPJS_SimpleTooltipHolderClose").length === 0){
$("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").attr("pin","1").prepend("<div class='SPJS_SimpleTooltipHolderHead'><div class='SPJS_SimpleTooltipHolderClose' onclick='SPJS_SimpleTooltip.hide(true);'></div></div>");
}
},
"hide":function(c){
if($("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").attr("pin") !== "1" || c){
$("#SPJS_SimpleTooltipPlaceholder").attr("pin","0").stop(true,true).fadeOut(100);
}
}
};
</script>
<!-- Example HTML -->
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
<tr>
<td valign="top">Field 1: </td>
<td valign="top"><input style="width:300px;" type="text">
<img onmouseover="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.show(this,'helpText1')" onmouseout="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.hide()" onclick="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.click(this)" src="/_layouts/images/hhelp.gif" border="0">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top">Field 2: </td>
<td valign="top"><input style="width:300px;" type="text">
<img onmouseover="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.show(this,'helpText2')" onmouseout="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.hide()" onclick="SPJS_SimpleTooltip.click(this)" src="/_layouts/images/hhelp.gif" border="0">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<!-- Example HTML -->
PS: It’s the <img> tags that calls the tooltip, the other HTML is for demonstration only.
I hope you can make use of this code.
Alexander
by Alexander Bautz via SharePoint JavaScripts
Error Received when Going to About Me on MySites
Dontcha just love it when an error occurs only for some people and not others? It makes for some challenging troubleshooting, but nothing too difficult for us seasoned SharePoint professionals!
The error occurred when a user would click on their About Me link, either in the Current Navigation or in the drop down under their name. They would receive the following error:
In my research, I found one blog post that claimed the culprits were unsupported characters (ie., ! @ # $ %) in the Ask Me About section of the user’s About Me section. The solution was to navigate directly to the Edit Details page by going to http://<mydomain>/_layouts/15/EditProfile.aspx?Interests=1 and deleting the offending character(s) from the Ask Me About section.
While trying this solution with a user, I was disappointed to see that she didn’t have any of those offending characters in her Ask Me About section. However, after navigating to the Edit Details page, she was able to navigate to her About Me page using the usual navigation links!
I’m guessing by going directly to the Edit Details page, SharePoint re-established the connection to the turbo encabulator, which we all know is necessary for the dingle arm to work correctly. However, if anyone else has a better explanation as to why this worked, please post in the Comments section.
by Darrell Houghton via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Moving from SPServices to REST, Part 1
In this series, you’ll learn how to transition from the SOAP Web Services – which SPServices supports – to REST. If your organization is making a transition to SharePoint 2013 or Office 365 & SharePoint Online (and anything hybrid in between), this series will help you develop new patterns, migrate your codebase, use OData effectively and more.
It’s been a nice, long ride for SPServices. If you aren’t familiar with SPServices, it’s freely available on Codeplex, Microsoft’s waning open source repository.
SPServices is a jQuery library that abstracts SharePoint’s Web Services and makes them easier to use. It also includes functions that use the various Web Service operations to provide more useful (and cool) capabilities. It works entirely client side and requires no server install.
The Web Services that SPServices abstracts for you are the older SOAP Web Services, sometimes known as XML services, or ASMX services. As I’ve said repeatedly at conferences and in posts (like this one) before, I think we still have many miles to go with the SOAP Web Services. Microsoft officially “deprecated” the SOAP Web Services as of the launch of SharePoint 2013, but I can’t see them fully disappearing for a good long time given the number of different ways they are used.
Two API sets are still supported in the SharePoint 2013 framework for backward compatibility, but we recommend that you not use them for new projects: the ASP.NET (asmx) web services, and direct Remote Procedure Calls (RPC) calls to the owssvr.dll file.
I started writing this series just after SPTechCon San Francisco in 2014, having talked to Andrew Connell and Scot Hillier about how I might be able to contribute to IT Unity for the site’s launch. Obviously the series fell by the wayside for quite a while, but these topics are even more relevant now than they were when they first came to me.
Like many of you, I drive an older model car. It is fun to drive, is comfortable and seems to be in great shape. The car may last me a while, yet from time to time I think about what I might want to drive next.
Photo Credit: “FIAT 600” by Andrea~S on Flickr http://ow.ly/wqxGN
At some point, we’ll all want to head into the dealer and get ourselves something shiny and new. To me, that something new is REpresentational State Transfer, also known as REST.
While SharePoint’s client-side object model (CSOM) can do a lot, it’s a SharePoint-specific technology. REST, however, is a Web standard. Many Web developers use REST to get their work done every day outside the SharePoint world. It’s time for those of us who develop on top of SharePoint to catch up with the rest of the Web development community. Most SharePoint developers have caught onto this reality in the last year or so.
When REST was first offered as an option in SharePoint 2010, it let us get some work done with lists, but that was about it. With SharePoint 2013 and even more so on Office365 with SharePoint Online and the Office365 APIs, the SharePoint team at Microsoft continues to give us more and more RESTful – or REST-driven – capabilities. New REST services have been introduced regularly and the existing services have been extended many times.
If you’ve loved working with SPServices, or at least you’ve gotten some good work done with it, this series of articles will help you to make the transition from the SOAP Web Services that SPServices wraps to the more open – and undoubtedly more robust over time – REST services offered in SharePoint 2013 and Office365. If you’re still running SharePoint 2007 or 2010 – as I know many of you are – this should still be a valuable series to you. By making some adjustments in your development style and the coding patterns that you follow, you can put yourself in an excellent position to move to REST when it becomes appropriate for you to do so.
Here are some of the things I plan to cover in this series:
- New patterns I suggest you follow with your SPServices code so that you’ll be better prepared to move to REST when the time comes. A side benefit of these new patterns will be better modularity and reusability in your SPServices-based code.
- You will learn ways to move parts of your code from SPServices to use REST even now with less effort than you might think. We’ll talk about where the most likely places in your codebase probably are and how to get started.
- We’ll look at how the functionality in the SOAP Web Services maps to the current REST services and where there are still gaps.
- We’ll talk about where OData comes in and how best to understand the OData componentry that sits under the SharePoint-specific implementation of REST. There are some differences from the standard (these gaps are narrowing all the time), and it’s important to know what those differences are and why they matter.
- As Microsoft adds more functionality to REST in SharePoint 2013 and Office 365, I’ll write new articles in the series to augment the base set of content. It’s not your father’s Microsoft anymore – the SharePoint team is moving fast and improvements are going to be coming Fast and Furious (see what I did there?)
It’s hard to give up the old car that you’ve driven for years, but sooner or later, it’s time. Maybe the engine starts knocking too much or the springs in the seat get uncomfortable. Maybe you just want to try out something new. It is sad letting the old girl go, but at some point, it’s simply time. I once held onto a car until the engine simply stopped working. You don’t want to be in a similar situation with your SharePoint functionality built on top of SOAP. Let’s start to plan for the future, and let’s do it together.
Photo Credit: “2014 Fiat 500” by Abdullah AlBargan on Flickr http://ow.ly/wqynJ
by Marc D Anderson via Marc D Anderson's Blog
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
SharePoint Talk: Spell Checking Custom Forms
MediaRich ECM for SharePoint Eases Access to, Use of Digital Content
PowerShell Script to get all the Active Directory groups in your SharePoint Farm
At a client recently, I was tasked to create an inventory of all the Active Directory Groups that give access to a SharePoint site! I built it mostly from scratch, so here it is as well as some explanations to help you use it:
The Script:
function WriteLogs ($message) {
$message | Out-File $logfile -append
}
$logfile = "C:\ADGroupInventory\grouplist.txt"
Write-Host "Starting Group Script inventory"
$was = Get-SPWebApplication
foreach ($wa in $was)
{
$webappUrl = $wa.url
Write-Host "Starting to look in $webappUrl"
$spWebApp = Get-SPWebApplication $wa.url
foreach($site in $spWebApp.Sites)
{
$siteurl = $site.url
Write-Host "Going into SiteCollection $siteurl"
$group = $site.RootWeb.SiteUsers
foreach ($grp in $group)
{
# Ensure the item is a domain group
if($grp.IsDomainGroup -eq "True")
{
$groupname = $grp.name
WriteLogs "$groupname"
}
}
}
}
How to use it.
First of all, change the $logfile variable to a folder that exists to make sure the logs work. Second, in the Central Administration, give yourself "Full Control" in the Web Application User Policy. This will make sure that you won't have any access denied when you go through each and every site collection in your farm. Afterwards, open SharePoint Management Shell as an Administrator, and run the script. Depending of the size of you farm, it shouldn't take too long, and you should see progress of every site being scanned on the screen. At the end, you will have a text file looking like this:
You will notice in the screenshot that some group names are repeated, as well as some of them are in capital and some of them are lowercase. So, I used NotePad++ to get all the unique group names! First of all, go in Edit > Convert Case to > Upercase!
To get unique lines, you will need the TextFX plugin. This used to be included in older versions of Notepad++, but if you have a newer version, you can add it from the menu by going to Plugins -> Plugin Manager -> Show Plugin Manager -> Available tab -> TextFX -> Install. In some cases it may also be called TextFX Characters, but this is the same thing.
After the plugin is installed, go in TestFX Tools and check the "sort ascending" and "sort outputs only UNIQUE" lines. Afterwards, click the "Sort lines case insensitive at column". (make sure that you do Ctrl+a in the file to select all the lines before clicking).
Now, your Notepad++ will only show the unique group names in your SharePoint Farm!
Drop a comment if this helped!
Leave a comment and don't forget to like the Absolute SharePoint Blog Page on Facebook and to follow me on Twitter here for the latest news and technical articles on SharePoint. Also, don't forget to check out SharePoint Community.Net for more great SharePoint Content.
The post PowerShell Script to get all the Active Directory groups in your SharePoint Farm appeared first on Absolute SharePoint Blog by Vlad Catrinescu.
by Vlad Catrinescu via Absolute SharePoint Blog by Vlad Catrinescu
Monday, March 23, 2015
Software purchasing tips for SharePoint admins:
One of the most important aspects of purchasing software is making sure you did your research about the product in question. Your CTO will want to know why part of their budget should be spent on a product that wasn’t essential to running your company previously. Here are a few tips about making strong purchasing tips when suggesting a new software product:
Be confident in your decision
Confidence is the most important factor people will take into account when you are giving your presentation. Your role in the purchasing process is not the buyer, it is being an internal salesperson. This means you need to be not only persuasive, but mentally prepared to go up against people opposed to your idea. Make sure you are ready to back your decision and present a strong case about why this particular product is needed.
Research the competition
One of the first questions you might hear will be about what other options are out there on the market. Do your research on your particular product’s competition and put together a brief cheat-sheet about why the product you chose is the best option out there on the market.
*star negotiator skill: ask your sales rep for some tips about their competition. Chances are they have lots of insider information about why their product beats their competitors hands-down in the SharePoint marketplace.
Educate yourself
Do your homework before making your case to your CTO. Nobody wants to waste their time listening to a presentation that goes around in circles. Be sure to research your desired product’s functionality and capabilities. Compare what the new product can accomplish versus what your current product is lacking. Make sure to include any technical installation requirements and guidelines. Your CTO will be very impressed that you took the extra initiative!
Go beyond price, but keep the numbers
Price is a very easy category to compare other products to, because it is hard to argue with numbers. What happens when your product is the more expensive choice? This is the time to go beyond price, but still use numbers to make your case. Use metrics that show how much time you would save with this new product. Once your CTO sees that this product will start saving her/him money long term, your case is hard to argue with. After all, time is money!
Put together a spreadsheet
Let’s be honest, putting together powerpoint presentations occupy a lot of our time. Just thinking about the idea of creating another one can get overwhelming. You might even start to regret researching a new product to begin with! One way to save time is to create a small spread-sheet that highlights the high-level facts about each product. This can include price, installation time, customer service, and functionality.
by Dylan Lake via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community
Avoid the Cloud: 6 Reasons To Keep SharePoint On-Premise
Friday, March 20, 2015
March Madness Slam-Dunks Business Productivity
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
There's an App for That--In SharePoint
Problem Creating SP 2013 Web Applications
1. Introduction
In setting up a SharePoint Server 2013 (single server) development environment, I came across a few problems. The initial installation seems to run smoothly. However, after the installation I could not create new web applications using Central Administration nor SharePoint PowerShell (a few days after).
2. The Problem
When trying to create new web applications, I was getting the error "Name cannot begin with the ',' character, hexadecimal value 0x2C. Line 15, position 34.". This made no sense to me whatsoever. I could see the web application in “…/_admin/WebApplicationList.aspx” list and in IIS. Browsing to the web application through IIS or in a browser away from the server directly where SharePoint was installed, I was getting “Server Error in ‘/’ Application.” As shown below in figure 2-1.
Figure 2-1
Looking around the web I found many so called resolutions but they mostly applied to ASP.NET and IIS only and did not actually work for SharePoint Server.
Many suggested that at “C:\inetpub\wwwroot\wss\VirtualDirectories\” in the port for the web application, I should alter the “web.config” file to;
- Debug=”true” instead of the default of Debug=”false”
- CallStack=”true” instead of the default of CallStack=”false”
- CustomErrors=”Off” instead of the default of CustomErrors=”On
As mentioned, this did not work for the “web.config” file for the initial “SharePoint – 80” web application that was created via Configuration Wizard. The root folder of a new web application I was trying to create was completely empty. No folders and no “web.config” file to play with.
This led me to look at the log file at “C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\15\LOGS”. Doing a Ctrl + F of the correlation ID, I was seeing that the web application I was trying to create wasn't being created because there was no connection to the SQL Server.
Hold on, before you MVPs or experts scream – I am not allowed to use “SharePoint Log Viewer” or “ULS Viewer” on the development server until it had been approved by the infrastructure team. In the meantime, I was trying to resolve a problem (so that I can start some custom development).
3. The Solution
After wondering, reading on msdn.com and chatting on sharepoint-community.net, I figured out that the problem was RAM. According to Microsoft or technet.microsoft.com, a minimum of 8GB of RAM is required for a Single server with a built-in database or single server that uses SQL Server for small deployments (fewer than 1,000 users – which applies to me). Although I started out with 16GB of RAM, that wasn't enough. Figure 3-1 shows SQL and SharePoint services not running.
Figure 3-1
4. Conclusion
SQL Server consumes a lot of RAM. Essential SQL services such as SQL Server (MSSQLSERVER) and SQL Server Agent (MSSQLSERVER) would stop by themselves even though their “Startup type” was set to automatic (production set-up has SQL, SP and other services running on different servers).
An increase to 32 GB or double the RAM was enough to keep all SQL services running. As you may all know if either SQL and or SharePoint Services (mainly SharePoint Administration) aren't running this means that SharePoint sites will be inaccessible.
by Larry Saytee via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Delve: Now You DO Know What You Don't Know
by via SharePoint Pro
Monday, March 16, 2015
Easily Compare Office 365 Plans
Last week I attended and spoke at an amazing new conference in Toronto called CollabCon. The organizing was great, speakers were amazing and attendees were really fun and engaging & I highly recommend that if you’re from Canada, you should attend the 2016 event. However, this is not what this blog post is aboutJ. While at the conference, Microsoft had a booth and they gave away a small pamphlet in which you could easily compare Office 365 plans. I found the pamphlet a lot easier to read and view the differences between plans than the web version which you can find here.
Here is what the pamphlet contains:
What is Office 365?
Office 365 for Small & Midsize Business
Enterprises & Non Profits
Government and Education
What do you think about this pamphlet? Do you find it more useful than the web version? Do you have a site where it’s easier to compare? Let me know in the comments!
To visit CollabCon click the logo below
To visit the web version of the O365 Plan Compare click the logo below
The post Easily Compare Office 365 Plans appeared first on Absolute SharePoint Blog by Vlad Catrinescu.
by Vlad Catrinescu via Absolute SharePoint Blog by Vlad Catrinescu
Saturday, March 14, 2015
SPJS Poll for SharePoint v2.0
I have brushed up the 5 year old solution Poll for SharePoint, to change the deprecated “Google Image Charts to use Google Charts (AKA Google Visualization). The Image Charts are officially deprecated, but will probably continue working for some time, but to ensure you have a working solution, you should upgrade to this new version.
Please note that there are some changes to the Content Editor Web Part code, so existing users must not only update the script file, but also look over the CEWP code and make some small changes.
v2.0 released. This one has no new functionality, but the code has been brushed up, and now the charts are generated using “Google Charts” rather than “Image Charts”.
- Answer: Single line of text
- Question: Single line of text
Name it anything you like, but keep the display name fairly simple (no special characters) as you will use the display name in the CEWP code.
The CEWP code below refers jQuery from Google. If you have a local copy of jQuery you can change the script src. You find the code for the file “SPJS-Poll.js” at the bottom of the page.
<div id="SPJS_Poll"></div>
<link type="text/css" href="/Scripts/Poll/spjs_poll.css" rel="stylesheet">
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ift.tt/JuZcy0"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ift.tt/1Jnp6Q0"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="/Scripts/spjs-utility/spjs-utility.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="/Scripts/Poll/SPJS-Poll.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
// Preload the chart solution
google.load("visualization", "1", {"packages":["corechart","table"]});
// If you want to override these texts, uncomment the object and localize as you like.
/*
spjs.poll.text = {
"submitLinkText":"Submit",
"backLinkText":"Back",
"showResultBtnText":"Show result",
"pollNotActiveText":"The poll is not active prior to {0}",
"pollEndedText":"The poll ended on {0}",
"alreadyRespondedText":"You answered: ",
"totalResponsesLabel":"Total responses: ",
"chartLegendLabels":["Answer","Count"]
};
*/
spjs.poll.init({pollAnswerListName:'Poll',
listBaseUrl:L_Menu_BaseUrl,
id:"Poll_3", // Allowed characters id a-z, 0-9 - and _
start:"01/02/2015", // format: mm/dd/yyyy
end:"03/15/2015", // format: mm/dd/yyyy
singleResponse:false,
q:"What is your favorite junk food?",
qStyle:"font-size:1.5em;color:#444;",
aStyle:"font-size:xx-small",
a:["Pizza","Hot dog","Hamburger","Neither of them"], // Leave empty for free input
color:["red","green","blue","orange"],
forceLowerCaseAnswer:false, // Group result by lowercase
chart:"col", // table, bar, col or pie
height:200,
width:500});
</script>
Object attributes explained
- pollAnswerListName: DisplayName or GUID of the list that stores the answers
- listBaseUrl: The baseUrl of the site. This is like “/sites/hr” when the list is located in the site “hr” under “/sites”. Use L_Menu_BaseUrl (or omit the property) for current site.
- id: The unique id of the poll. All poll answers are stored in a list and this id is used to separate each poll
- start: Start date in the format mm/dd/yyyy
- end: End date in the format mm/dd/yyyy
- singleResponse: true for one reply per user, false for unlimited number of replies
- q: Poll question. To have a linefeed in the question, use <br>
- qStyle: CSS syntax style
- aStyle: CSS syntax style
- a: Answers in an array format. To use free input and not predefined answers, leave the array empty.
- color: Colors for the chart in an array format. This must have the same length as the previous parameter – one color for each answer
- forceLowerCaseAnswer: Primarily for use with free input to avoid getting two “series” when the only difference are uppercase characters.
- chart: “bar” for bar chart, “col” for column chart, “pie” for pie chart or “table” for a plain table.
- height: Height in pixels
- width: Width in pixels
If you leave the attribute “a” as an empty array, the user can supply free text as “answer”. When using free input, the result are automatically presented as a table.
The code for the file SPJS-Poll.js. You find spjs-utility.js here.
Post any questions in the forum
Alexander
by Alexander Bautz via SharePoint JavaScripts
Arctic SharePoint Challenge 2015 Notes – Part 2
A few weeks ago I posted from the Arctic SharePoint Challenge in Oslo, Norway. Now that I’ve been home for a while, I *still* think it was a really cool thing to have the chance to attend. I was flattered to be asked to give a keynote on the first day and to act as a jurist (or judge – depending on who was talking) for the event.
Here I am with the other judges (from Left) :Christian Nesmark, Harald Fianbakken, and Chris Givens. We only had one robe.
I wanted to post the links to each team’s repository, if only to save them for my own use down the road. The stuff these folks came up with was truly impressive!
You can read the narratives behind the code on the blog where each team posted their progress and requests for the valuable badges.
Enjoy!
- Infozurg (Darth vader restaurant)
http://ift.tt/19lE2AP - Puzzlepart (Empire security)
http://ift.tt/1xnNuJ7 - Itera (Wearable data)
http://ift.tt/19lE0ZI - Inmates: (infrastructure as an app)
http://ift.tt/1xnNuJ8 - Point Taken (big red button media)
http://ift.tt/19lE0ZJ - Skill wizards (just news) – in time..)
http://ift.tt/19lE2AT - KnowItAll (Support tool – Arctic support request)
http://ift.tt/1xnNvNg - Altran (music/artist review, planning)
http://ift.tt/19lE2AV
by Marc D Anderson via Marc D Anderson's Blog
Friday, March 13, 2015
Windows 10: SharePoint, Business Apps Need Consumer Balance
Wednesday, March 11, 2015
How To Create Killer Content on SharePoint
by via SharePoint Pro
Overcoming the Top Eight Challenges During Notes-to-SharePoint Migrations
Tuesday, March 10, 2015
The 9 Biggest Insider Threats to SharePoint
by via SharePoint Pro
What does it take to become a SharePoint Power User?
The short answer is about 5 to 7 hours.
Here at SP Marketplace we have implemented over 400 Intranet Portal and business solutions for our customers. Key to success is having an “owner” of the solution, often not a SharePoint technician, but rather a business person who is a SharePoint Power User.
BUT who is the best person in your organization to be the Power User? The obvious answer is most likely not the best answer. While your IT people may understand the technology behind your business, and keep everything humming along quite nicely, they do not understand your business practices. In fact your typical IT staffer is possibly the worst person for this role! The person you want, is the one who is not only a little technology savvy, but understand the needs and requirements of your business, and is able to then interpret what each department’s needs are, and translate this into the best business processes implemented in SharePoint. This may even be the person who can make Excel sing and dance to create all those reports with the graphs that you like.
There are lots of training and instructional videos out there that can take them from the novice user to the power user level. Look at http://www.lynda.com or http://ift.tt/1KPREoC for some great examples of what is available out there (the latter is even free).
Just by watching some of these will help you gain a better understanding of how powerful a tool SharePoint can be. It is much more than a document repository/management tool. Once they have an understanding of not only how lists and libraries work, but workflows and permissions as well, they will be able to not only successfully configure your SharePoint sites, but are then are able to add more functionality to this business platform.
Another point you will want to consider is how you are going to administer each department site as well. As your Power User won’t want to be inundated with requests to add new announcements, change some of the existing links, or even manage the contents of the emails that are sent out when a new ticket is logged. For this you want to ensure that the content is easily managed by an appointed person in each department.
It no longer is just a set of static pages like a home-made website, but a powerful tool, that will let you perform a lot of business workflows, like approval processes, and manage tickets quickly and effectively with its own built in reporting functions. A well designed SharePoint site collection can allow a small to medium sized company to forgo the ongoing expense of lots of Siloed applications, which will have no inter-relation to each other, and have this replaced by a single platform to manage most if not all of your business needs—all in one place.
Just ask yourself…How much is a well-designed, correctly maintained platform worth to your organization? Make sure that you have the right person for the job. They will need to know how your staff communicates with each other, and how information flows around your organization. This will ensure that not only is the correct information being delivered to the correct people, but also greatly assist in the behind the scenes automation and reduce in the manual handling (and mishandling) of the communications around your organization.
So while you need someone who not only understands the capabilities of SharePoint, and what it cannot do, they need to be someone who understands your business processes to be able to translate that into your business environment. Then you will have a site that can not only sing and dance, but perform for you and your organization.
Learn more at SP Marketplace.
by Darrell Trimble via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community
Monday, March 9, 2015
Will Apple Watch Be the Killer Device for SharePoint?
by via SharePoint Pro
Sunday, March 8, 2015
How Office 365 Can Get Project Managers on the SharePoint Train
by via SharePoint Pro
Friday, March 6, 2015
Microsoft Office 2016 for Mac Preview Is Cloud-Enabled, Accessible via SharePoint
How to invite external users using SharePoint Designer Workflows in Office 365 (Online)
In this article, I want to review a part of Customer Collaboration System, which can be used to share documents with clients and cooperative work on common projects. This ‘proof of concept’ was build using SharePoint Online and Plumsail Workflow Actions Pack.
Architecture description
Core of our system is a simple document library which contains different folders, each folder matches to one of clients and contains common documents (and other folders) which will be available for a client. The permission restriction will be carried out with help of SharePoint Groups. For each of our clients will be created own SharePoint group. Each folder in the document library will be matched to SharePoint group by name.
All internal logic concluded in two workflows, which start on “Item Creation” event. Additionally we will have two custom lists: "Companies" and "Contacts". We will use these lists as dictionaries to store information about clients. “Contacts” list contains user email and lookup to “Companies” List.
The common architecture scheme I have provided below:
How does it look for end user?
For example, we want to share contract with our contractor. Firstly, we need to add contractor’s company in “Companies” list and add a couple of contractor’s employee into “Contacts” list. Right after that, we can upload any documents inside contractor’s folder in the documents library. All contractor’s employee will get an email invitation that look like at the figure below and will have access to shared documents.
Create new Company workflow
The “Create new company” workflow is very simple it does only three things:
- Creates new SharePoint group with name of company;
- Creates new folder in “Documents” library;
- Grants permission on created folder;
This workflow is configured to start on list item creation in “Companies” list.
There is only one moment on which I want to pay attention, it is parameter "Folder ID". It was filled the following way. We need to know folder ID to grant permission to folder by a workflow action.
Invite External Users Workflows
There is another very simple workflow, which contains only a few Workflow Action, please pay attention that I used Invite External Users workflow action.
This workflow is configured to start on list item creation in “Companies” list.
Before using this workflow action please turn on option “Allow external users who accept sharing invitations and sign in as authenticated users” in site collection administration interface (usually it at the following URL: “https://yousitehttp://ift.tt/1FjiQFq”).
Conclusion
In this short article I briefly reviewed a part of implementation of Custom Collaboration System, based on SharePoint Online and Workflow Actions Pack. I hope you will go ahead and do more complex systems. Additionally I want to mention that using external users allows you to save your money on licenses for Office 365 users.
Please feel free to comment the article, I am curious about your cases and implementations.
Original article is available in our blog.
by Roman Rylov via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
The SharePoint and Office 365 Roadshow (hosted by Metalogix) - Register Today!
The SharePoint and Office 365 Roadshow is coming to a city near you, bringing a host of exclusive sessions from Microsoft and local MVPs.
Register now for an immersive day learning about Microsoft’s cloud for SharePoint and Office 365—and how to enhance, protect and collaborate in these promising new platforms.
There is no registration fee—this is a complimentary event, and attendees are eligible to win a Surface tablet!
Register now to save your spot:
- Microsoft Schiphol, Amsterdam - 18 March 2015
- Microsoft Thames Valley Park, Reading, UK - 1 April 2015
- Microsoft, Cologne – 17 April 2015
- Microsoft Development Centre, Copenhagen – 21 May 2015
- Microsoft Development Centre, Dublin – June 2015
This is a unique opportunity to network with Microsoft thought leaders and local IT leaders.
Places are limited so register early!
by Mark Jones via Everyone's Blog Posts - SharePoint Community